"Then I ain't letting you do this alone."
"Colt, you don't have to?—"
"Shut up, Ace. You're my little brother. You think I'm going to sit on this ranch while you fly into a war zone by yourself?" He pulls out his phone. "I'll call the pilot. You've got twenty minutes to pack. And I’ll tell Hunter. We’re going to be in serious shit for this."
"I need ten."
"Then you've got ten."
He dials. I'm already moving. Toward the house. Toward the only decision I've ever been completely certain of.
Three hundred and seventy miles. That's what separates me from her. One hour in the air. Another thirty on the ground. She's alone in a city full of enemies, covered in a dead man's blood.
I'm coming, Goldie.
I promised her two hours. I'll make it in ninety minutes.
And God fuckin’ help anyone who gets in my way.
CHAPTER SEVENTY-FOUR
Harper
I killed a man.
I thought he was just unconscious. I thought I had minutes to figure this out, to run, to call someone. But then he let out this sound, and I just knew.
I checked his pulse. Pressed my fingers to his neck the way they teach you in first aid courses you take and never think you'll need. Nothing. No beat. No rhythm. I killed my husband.
And as part of our prenup, I still get a million-dollar house in LA that I didn't even want. I demanded it because I wanted something out of this hellish agreement. And the beach house was the first thing I could think of.
A house. For a murder.
No one will believe it was self-defense. No one will believe he blackmailed me for months. Forced me into a marriage. Controlled every aspect of my life. They'll see the pregnant wife. The other man's baby. The billionaire's son dead on his own kitchen floor with his own award embedded in his skull.
They'll see a killer trying to grab her money. I don’t want any of it.
I can't go to jail. I can't have this baby in a cell. I can't?—
I stare at the phone in my hand. Ace is coming. He told me he loves me. He's getting on a jet and flying into a city he was told never to enter, for me.
I throw the blanket from the couch over Hudson's body because I can't look at the blood anymore. Can't look at the way his hand is still reaching toward me on the tile.
And then I sit on the floor. My back against the kitchen island. My hands on my stomach.
And I wait.
Wait for the man who would burn down the world for me, just like Gianna said he would. Wait for him to walk through that door and tell me it's going to be alright, even when it isn't. Wait for the moment I have to look him in the eye and tell him the truth—all of it, every piece I've been hiding—and hope he doesn't hate me.
That somewhere in Hudson's files is our sex tape. Pictures of me he stole from my phone. That he used them to trap me. That he wanted to be the legal father of Ace's baby. That I married a monster to protect a man who didn't know he needed protecting.
I have to tell him he’s going to be a father because Hudson switched my birth control out.
The tears keep falling. I've stopped trying to wipe them. They drip off my jaw and land on my shirt, and I don't care. I just stare at the blanket on the floor and the shape underneath it and try to understand how this is my life.
I don't move. I lose track of time. The clock on the wall ticks, and the refrigerator hums, and the sun shifts across the kitchen floor, moving the shadows, and I just sit here rubbing small circles on my belly.
"It's going to be okay, baby," I whisper.
